For online sales, you need to collect taxes and forward the collected amounts to the tax authorities (for example, sales taxes in the US, VAT in Europe, GST in Canada, and more). If you have already set up sales taxes in Retail POS, you can duplicate those rates for your online store.

There are two ways to set up taxes for your eCom store:

• Automatic taxes: Available for merchants in the USA, Europe, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Canary Islands, Melilla, and Ceuta. Automatic taxes provide up-to-date rates across the store and can be enabled in a single click.
• Manual taxes: If automatic taxes are not available for your country, your business requires a custom taxation scheme, or you need to apply a different local sales tax based on your customer's location, configure taxes manually.

Setting up automatic taxes

To set up automatic taxes:

1. Navigate to the Online tab > Settings > General.
2. Scroll down to the Company address section and enter your legal company address. This address is needed to calculate and apply the right tax rate to orders at checkout.

   

3. Navigate to Online > Overview > Go to eCom (E-Series) to open the eCom Admin Panel.

   

4. In the left-hand menu, hover over Settings, then select Taxes.
5. Enable automatic taxes by clicking the toggle.

   

Once enabled, automatic taxes will determine a precise tax rate at checkout depending on where you and your customer are located and will apply tax to each order.

By default, the same standard tax rate of your store’s region applies to all products. If some of your products are taxed differently (for example, they are tax-exempt), you can change the tax rate for those products.

Setting up manual taxes

You can manually configure your online store to calculate tax rates for different regions, zones, and countries. You should set up taxes manually if automatic taxes are not available for your country or if you need a complex taxation scheme tailored to your business.

The instructions below use a 10% tax for a state to illustrate the setup process.

Step 1: Add a zone

Create a destination zone for the tax rate to apply. A destination zone, or a shipping region, is a geographical area that you ship to. With zones, you can define where you sell and how much you charge for delivering orders to various customer locations.

If the same tax rate applies to several different states, you can create one zone consisting of these states and set up a tax rate for this zone.

To add a zone for the tax:

1. Navigate to Online > Overview > Go to eCom (E-Series) to open the eCom Admin Panel.

   

2. In the left-hand menu, hover over Settings, then select Taxes.
3. In the Manual section, click Manage Tax Rates.

   

4. Click + Add New Tax and Save.
5. Click Manage zones (global) to open the Destination Zones page.

   

6. Click + Add New Zone.
7. Click Add State, Add Country, or Add Region and add the necessary state, country, or region.

   

8. Set a clear name for the zone. For example, States with a 10% tax rate. Tax zones and destination zones are displayed on the same Zones page, so make sure to include the word "taxes" in the name of your tax zone to avoid confusing it with another shipping zone you may create. Customers won't see the name you picked for the zone.
9. Click Save.

Step 2: Add a tax rate for the zone

1. Navigate to Online > Overview > Go to eCom (E-Series) to open the eCom Admin Panel.

   

2. In the left-hand menu, hover over Settings, then select Taxes. If automatic taxes are enabled, make sure to toggle it off.

   

3. In the Manual section, click Manage Tax Rates.
4. Click + Add New Tax.
5. Enter your tax name. For example, 10% Tax. Customers will see the name you picked for the tax at checkout.

   

6. If the tax applies to all products, check the Enabled by default for all products option.
7. Choose whether the tax applies only to the subtotal or the subtotal and shipping.
8. Choose whether a shipping or billing address defines the zone for a customer.
9. Click Specify rates per zone. Select the zone you created in Step 1 and enter the applicable tax rate.
10. Make sure the tax is enabled and save the changes.

If you have several taxes and/or zones, repeat the steps above for each one.

Managing tax nexus locations

Optionally, if you're US-based and need to customize nexus rates for different locations:

1. Navigate to the Tax Nexus Locations page
2. Click the Manage Nexus dropdown or Edit Address in Lightspeed POS to edit locations where you have a tax nexus and you're collecting taxes.
3. Confirm your changes and click Save.

What's next?